Holding On, Letting Go
by Shanaqui
Summary: Rinoa can't let Squall go, ever. SquallxRinoa.


"No," Rinoa says, crouching down next to his body. She tugs him half into her lap, brushing his hair back, hoping that under her familiar touch things will be alright again, Squall will cough and gasp and breathe again, and the deep wound in his chest will fade away, an illusion to bring her to the edge of panic, somebody's cruel game. She hopes for fields of flowers and the storm clouds rolling back. Squall doesn't move. "No, no, no."

She hears someone calling them, not too far away. "Commander! Sorceress! Everything okay?"

_Sorceress_. With a smile that isn't quite her usual sweet smile, Rinoa bends her head over Squall. Her eyes glow oddly for a moment, and then she closes them, her use of power stirring the dark, scrubby grass around them. Squall's heart is still and cold, his blood all gushed out through the wound. She replaces it with power, running through his veins, stirring his tired heart back into motion. She puts her hand over it, pouring more and more magic into him, until she can feel his heart racing, his body suddenly moving into an overdrive powered only by magic -- the wound closing, flesh knitting itself back together.

"I couldn't do anything without you," she whispers to him, wrapping him in her power, drawing him closer and holding him in her arms, holding tight, binding him with her magic at the same time. She opens her eyes again, looking down at him. She strokes his hair fondly, like a mother would a child.

She stops when the wound is small enough that it isn't fatal, large enough to account for all the blood. As the SeeD runs towards her, in sight now, she casts a simpler healing spell, one he'd understand, knitting the flesh back together.

In her arms, Squall opens his eyes.

"Is everything all right, Commander?" the SeeD asks, nervously. Rinoa sees his eyes flickering to her and then back to Squall.

It only takes a breath of magic this time, the tiniest touch, and Squall is rising to his feet, ignoring the sticky blood soaking his shirt. "Everything is fine. The mission is complete. Round everyone up and head back to Garden. Me and Sorceress Rinoa will rejoin you shortly."

"Sir!" the cadet says, saluting crisply and turning on his heel. This, he understands. Rinoa only feels the tiniest stab of annoyance at the fact that he's clearly afraid of her. Let them be afraid. Perhaps they should be.

Squall turns to her, a frown creasing his face, crinkling his eyebrows. "Rinoa, you shouldn't -- "

She raises a hand, wrapping him in yet another spell. "Silence," she tells him, and her eyes glow a little again. "I can't live without you."

There's an unhappy glint in his eyes she chooses to ignore. She takes his hand in hers and tangles their fingers, smiling up at him -- a light, pretty smile. The kind of smile she would smile back in Timber, when everything was simple and she was not the bearer of some great and terrible power. He smiles back, helplessly trapped and bound. Together, they walk back to Garden.

Where he lay in the grass, the grass is greener, fresher, brighter. The wind dissipates after a while, now only lightly stirring the patch of longer grass.

----

Squall leans against the wall, his hand to the place where the wound was. His eyes glow a little with a strange light -- like the light in Rinoa's eyes as she cast her spells to bind him to life. He looks as if he should be panting for breath, gasping in the throes of a heart attack or convulsion or _something_, but he's frighteningly still. His chest doesn't even move up and down.

Quistis doesn't notice all of this, because as she catches up to him, the light in his eyes grows brighter and he straightens up, his hand falling away. She does frown at him, though, looking into his face. "Squall? Are you alright? You were wounded on the last mission, weren't you? You should've had Kadowaki look at it. I mean, it was a couple of weeks ago, but if you're having trouble with it..."

"I'm... fine," he says, as if speaking is an effort. He smiles, belatedly, the smile somehow skewed. Quistis frowns slightly, but shakes her head, sure she must be imagining things.

"Have you finished looking through those requests I gave you? I wouldn't bother you about them, but Galbadia is pushing -- "

"I'll deal with it," Squall says, his mouth shutting so firmly after the words that his teeth click together. Quistis looks at him again carefully, noting the glow in his eyes.

"Is something wrong with Rinoa?"

"Rinoa..."

"Sorry," a voice says behind Quistis, making her jump. She spins around immediately, her hand immediately going to the handle of her whip, strapped at her side as always. It's only Rinoa, and she wonders for a moment why she reacted so quickly to such a familiar presence. Rinoa smiles disarmingly. "Sorry to startle you. I was just... experimenting with my power. It must've affected Squall somehow. I keep forgetting how linked we are, as Sorceress and Knight."

Behind Quistis, Squall is looking at Rinoa, his eyes their normal gray-blue now, but dead-looking, as if there's no one home behind. Rinoa smiles sweetly at him and puts her hand on his arm.

Quistis tastes the tang of magic in the air, but she doesn't say anything. "It's alright," she says to Rinoa. "I just need to talk to him about some queries from our clients."

"By all means," Rinoa says, waving a hand regally. She walks on along the corridor. Quistis watches as Squall turns slowly on his heel, watching her go, and then subtly changes -- something about his stance and the hold of his head. He turns back to her.

"Sorry."

"It's alright," Quistis says, nodding. "I just wanted to ask you to have a decision for me by tomorrow."

"That'll be fine."

She nods again and turns to walk along the corridor. For a moment, she contemplates turning on her heel and casting a scan spell on Squall -- nothing about him seems quite right, and the way Rinoa came quickly... But she carries on to her office, making a mental note to discuss things with Zell over lunch at some point. No point in panicking, though, she tells herself. Rinoa said it herself: she'd been experimenting with her power. That was bound to affect Squall.

Right?

Quistis wishes for a moment she'd asked what kind of experiments.

----

"Something's going on," Zell declares, falling into his seat with a surprising lack of grace from a martial artist. Quistis raises an eyebrow, taking a sip of her coffee and disguising her wince as she burns her mouth.

"What do you mean?"

"With Squall," he says, impatiently, waving a roll around. Quistis is half-afraid Zell's soup will end up all over him, her and the floor. She doesn't particularly like the prospect of being plastered in tomato soup. "He's not the same as always and Rinoa is never far from him -- I mean, she's normally clingy, but not like this. And she keeps saying she's doing _experiments_ with her powers, but she'll never say what."

"I didn't ask her what," Quistis says, musingly.

"I did." Zell dips his roll into his soup and takes a huge bite. He at least has the manners to keep his mouth shut when he's chewing, but for now Quistis concentrates on her sandwich, making a face at the amount of butter on the bread. She hears Zell swallow, and gets ready to bang him on the back if necessary. He makes a face at her when he notices her half out-stretched hand. "Stop that. Anyway, there's something going on."

"I wanted to cast a scan spell on Squall..."

"I think it's a good idea," Zell says, suddenly more serious. "Maybe he's, I don't know, possessed."

"That's impossible," Quistis says, before she thinks about it. And then she grimaces. "Usually impossible, anyway. Only sorceresses can do that, I think. Not like... ghosts and stuff."

"Maybe it's a monster we've never come across," Zell says, shrugging slightly. And then, giving her a sidelong glance; "Maybe it's Rinoa. She _is_ acting suspiciously too. I think we _should_ cast a scan spell on Squall."

"I don't know if that would show if he's possessed, _if_ such a thing were possible. It never did with Matron or Seifer."

"It'd be a place to _start_, at least."

Quistis nods, her sandwich now abandoned. "Do you think we should tell Irvine and Selphie? Get them to help us?"

Zell shrugs, finishing his soup. Quistis stifles a giggle at his tomato soup moustache until he licks it away, and then raises her eyebrow at him, kicking him gently under the table to get his thoughts back on track. He huffs softly. "I don't know. Maybe not. I mean... no need to disturb their honeymoon if it's nothing, right? And we hardly need a team of four to cast a scan spell."

"True..."

He studies her for a moment as she loses herself in thought, and then sighs, swallowing the last piece of bread and tipping his seat back onto two legs. "I'll do the spell casting. I can easily go and see Squall alone in his office, right? Even if Rinoa always turns up in two minutes flat when anyone goes near him, I can cast a scan spell right off."

"Are you sure?"

Zell shrugs. "Yeah. He won't attack me, right?"

Quistis fights a smile. "If he's possessed..."

She yelps when he kicks her under the table, crossing his arms in front of his chest and letting his chair settle back onto four legs. "I can deal with it, Quisty. It's not like you'd be any better, and if we both go it's sure to alert him or her or whatever that there's something going on."

"Alright then," Quistis says, nodding slightly. And then she finds herself smiling. It's a relief to have a plan, to know that someone else agrees with her. And she's glad that it's Zell: sometimes, he doesn't seem like the sharpest crayon in the box, and then he surprises you.

"I'm sure we'll find that nothing's wrong," Zell says, with a grin that's meant to be reassuring.

"Yes," she says, but she _isn't_ sure.

----

Rinoa sits on her bed, brushing her hair. Squall sits in the chair by the door, horribly still now, his chest not moving up and down, his heart not beating. Rinoa frowns as she watches him, putting down her hairbrush and summoning up more magical power. "I don't understand," she tells him. "It was supposed to bring you back to life. To make you just the same as before."

"Let me go," Squall says, suddenly, his voice wooden, stilted. Somehow, though, desperation reaches through. It makes her angry. She raises her hand and snaps her fingers, and Squall's eyes deaden again and he falls back.

"I don't understand what's going wrong," she says to him, though now she doesn't want or expect an answer. She looks down at the floor, pouting petulantly like a kid whose toys have been taken away. She clasps her hands in her lap, her eyes glowing faintly in the dark-ish room. "It should have brought you back. I replaced your blood, made your heart beat, and though you don't breathe, now you don't need to... you should be _better_ than before."

He looks up at her. She imagines he looks helpless, unhappy. She gets up and goes across to him quickly, wrapping her arms around his neck and pressing her forehead to his as she sits on his knee.

"It'll be okay, Squall," she says, in what she imagines is a soothing voice. "It'll all be okay. I won't let you die."

"Already... dead..."

"You're _not_," she says, fiercely. The light in her eyes flares again. "You're not dead. Don't say such things. Forget about it. I'll figure it out soon and then everything will be right. You're just... you're just not well enough yet."

He shakes his head, slowly. He looks like a puppet with its strings cut, slumped in his chair. Rinoa wraps her arms around him tightly and kisses him on the lips, ignoring the chill of his skin.

"You're not dead," she whispers. "You'll never die. I won't let you go."

Her eyes close again, a breeze stirring Squall's hair and whipping hers back from her face as her lips move in a silent incantation. Silver light surrounds Squall briefly, and then sinks into his body, banishing rot and forcing his organs to, once again, work. She strengthens the magic that runs in place of blood and wraps him ever tighter in magic to keep him whole, to keep him from rotting.

Squall sits silently, unable to stop her. If she looked up now, she would see a look of horror in his eyes that would make her angry. She doesn't look up.

He closes his eyes, slowly. For a moment, Rinoa feels his soul struggle inside him, and then she wraps him in more magic, chaining him to the earth, to her, to life, to his body.

"You can't leave me," she says, anguish and childish horror in her voice.

And Squall stops struggling.

----

"This is serious," Zell says to Quistis, the minute he sees her. "I asked you to meet me here because -- well, we're going to have to explain things to Selphie and Irvine, and I'd rather not repeat myself a gazillion times. C'mon."

Quistis lets Zell grab her arm and tug her along. For a moment, she lets him sweep her along in his urgency. Time seems to pass almost in a blur until he's shoving her none-too-gently into a seat and shutting the door firmly behind them. She bites her lip, looking up at Irvine and Selphie's confused faces. "Sorry about this..."

"Except not," Zell says, huffing impatiently. He puts a hand on his hip, in a way Quistis thinks -- an irrational giggle rising in her throat -- is something like the way Squall stands when he's not quite sure of himself. "Something really, really bad has happened. Squall is dead."

Selphie frowns. "Zell, I saw him this morning..."

"He's a zombie."

"No way," Selphie says, shaking her head, and Quistis' fists clench. Irvine remains silent, looking from Zell to Quistis and back, apparently withholding judgement. "Why would Squall be a zombie? We'd know if something like that had happened to him."

"Me and Quistis were worried about him and Rinoa. They were both acting strangely... so today I made an excuse to see Squall in his office. I cast a scan spell, and... well, first it told me that he was a zombie, and then it showed me this... golden net, all wrapped around him, like it was holding him in. He didn't react at all to the scan, but suddenly..."

"Rinoa arrived?"

Zell nods. "She pushed me out of the way and went over to Squall. She sort of touched his shoulder and... then his eyes glowed weirdly and he told me to get out."

Irvine bites his lip, leaning back in his seat and stretching his legs out. "What do you think has happened, then?"

Quistis stands up, starting to pace around. For a moment, the silence presses down on them; Zell moves from foot to foot, impatient and annoyed, Quistis paces, Irvine waits, and Selphie looks around at all of them, anxious, alert, like a hunting dog waiting for orders. Finally, Quistis clears her throat.

"It was reported that Squall had a wound. He was covered in blood when he came back, but he didn't visit Kadowaki and the next day there was no sign of the wound. Rinoa was with him when he was first seen on the battlefield, according to one of the SeeDs' reports -- "

"You actually read those things?"

Quistis glares at Zell for the interruption. "Yes, I do. I'd surmise that Squall received a wound that should have been deadly. Rinoa arrived before he died, and because she was desperately afraid of losing her knight, she cast spells to keep him alive. However, magic can't sustain a dead body completely. The strangeness we're seeing... I believe that comes from the fact that Squall is indeed dead. Gradually, he'll lose more and more of his personality and independant drive. Rinoa is already controlling him like a puppet."

"Which means there's a sorceress in charge of Garden, essentially," Irvine says, quietly. "A force sworn to protect the world _against_ sorceresses."

"What should we do?"

Quistis sighs softly. "I'm not sure. Perhaps if we fight her, force her to use her powers against us, she won't be able to maintain the level of power she's using on Squall."

"_Should_ we make her let him die?" Irvine asks, tipping his head slightly. Selphie puts both hands on her hips, rolling her eyes.

"Of course we should! Squall's our friend, god knows he deserves some rest, and it's wrong anyway. And like _you_ said, even if she is -- or was -- our friend, we can't have a sorceress in control of Garden. And with Squall... well, dead, then she doesn't have a knight. She'll be going bonkers anyway."

"Then I guess... I guess we should lure her out," Zell says, slowly. "To somewhere we can fight her without anyone getting in the way. The further from Squall, I think, the better."

Selphie smiles brightly. "Just leave that bit to me."

----

Rinoa looks around at them, at their drawn weapons, at Zell's raised fists, in utter bewilderment. "I don't understand," she says, sounding like the familiar, sometimes petulant spoilt princess they all know. "I haven't done anything... why are you threatening me? Why did you lure me away from Squall?"

"You've no right to keep him alive when he should be dead!" Zell says, hotly.

"I won't let him go," she says, hands clenched at her sides. "I won't!"

There's power in her voice, now, a wind stirring the grass. Quistis and Zell exchange glances, each taking a step forward. Quistis tries to keep her voice soothing and reasonable all the same. "He's dead, Rinoa. You have no hold on him now."

"I can't let him go!"

The first spell takes Quistis almost unawares, knocking her down to the ground. She rises slowly, nodding slightly when Irvine gives her a concerned look. Zell leaps forward in the same moment, landing a barrage of blows on Rinoa before a golden shield forms in front of her, blurring the edges of her figure and throwing Zell back as well.

"A projectile weapon should punch through that," Irvine says, eyeing the barrier. He raises Exeter, taking careful aim. At the same moment Quistis and Selphie both step forward, weapons swinging into action -- slowed by the shield, but not stopped entirely. It's easy to fall into a rhythm, and Quistis almost feels guilty for it -- Rinoa is their friend, and Squall loved her. Surely it shouldn't be so easy to fight her?

But they all learned to fight what is evil when they forced themselves to see only Sorceress Edea and not their beloved Matron, Quistis thinks. She swings Save the Queen in a lazy arc and then snaps it, bursting through the barrier with an audible pop and slapping Rinoa across the face. "Let him go and we won't have to fight you!"

"He's _mine_," Rinoa cries, her voice horrible with power and her eyes bright and golden. She raises her hand and fire spurts out, surrounding Selphie. Quistis catches sight of Irvine throwing a potion to Selphie as she steps forward again, ducking to escape another tongue of flame. Zell flings himself forward at the same time -- seeming to move in slow motion for a minute as he forces himself through the shield, and then returning to pummeling Rinoa.

"What the -- " Irvine starts, straightening up, and then, levelling his gun at Rinoa again -- "Squall's coming this way. How'd he get here so fast?"

"The dead travel fast," Quistis says, wryly. She gasps as an ice spells wraps around her for a moment, cursing aloud as the feeling fades. "We need to finish this before he gets here."

"Aye aye, cap'n!" Selphie grins, stepping back and concentrating for a moment. She makes a gesture towards Rinoa and the golden shield is, all of a sudden, gone. Quistis and Zell immediately take advantage, leaping to the attack. Quistis is sure it won't be enough, even with Irvine casting aura spells and firing for all he's worth. Somehow, she can sense Squall's approach -- now a being of almost pure magic, it seems, blazing brightly with all the power Rinoa can spare.

She feels the effects of a haste spell speeding up her heart, speeding up her reactions, slowing down the world around her. She strikes out at Rinoa, again and again, putting her whole body behind the whip's sharp strikes. She can see Zell fighting for all he's worth, not sparing the time to heal a jagged cut down the side of his face -- by the looks of it, cut by an icicle flung by Rinoa. The ringing in her ears obscures the sound of Irvine's shots, but she knows he's still there. And across from her, taking advantage of every weakness, Selphie grins at her.

Quistis feels the power flare: sees it as a great rush of power suddenly returns to Rinoa, making her fall onto her knees from the impact. The grass around them seems longer, greener, and a great wind whips up around their legs, tugging at their clothes. She jumps back, catching sight of Squall now -- fallen forward onto the ground, surrounded by a glow of light.

"What's happening?" Selphie asks, sounding breathless. There's blood smeared over her face -- she, too, was a victim of one of Rinoa's volleys of ice.

"It worked," Quistis says, and she sounds just as breathless. "I think."

"No," Rinoa moans, "no, no, no. I can't do anything without you, Squall. You can't die."

Quistis looks away from Squall's pathetic, collapsed body, and looks at Rinoa. She's slumped on the ground, her hands clutching the sides of her head, fingers tangled into her hair. She looks distraught.

Slowly, Quistis takes a few steps towards her and crouches down beside her, and then she puts her arms around her. "It's okay, Rinoa. Everybody has a time to die. It's Squall's. Let him go, if you love him."

"I can't let him go," she sobs. There's a long silence, punctuated by Rinoa's soft sobs. The wind caused by the magic dies down, and Quistis carefully pulls away, looking up at the others.

"Get back to Garden," she says to Irvine and Selphie, who are standing by; the former looking awkward, the latter just looking sad. "Call Esthar immediately. Zell and I will bring Rinoa."

"No!" Rinoa cries, as Irvine and Selphie nod and run off at an quick pace. Quistis crouches down again, touching Rinoa's cheek.

"I'm sorry," she says.

"No! You can't seal me! It's not right! Murderers!"

Zell winks at Quistis. A moment later, Quistis is able to catch Rinoa as she wilts under the influence of a well-placed sleep spell. She looks down at Rinoa's face, now relaxed, with no sign that she was ever a crazed sorceress keeping a man alive who should be dead. "There's nothing to do but seal her, but..."

"It's the friend's thing to do," Zell says, softly. "Squall would do the same thing."

Quistis wraps her arms around Rinoa's body, lifting her carefully. She glares at Zell when he starts forward to help, and forces words out past a sudden blockage in her throat. "Get Squall's body. He deserves a funeral. I'll bring Rinoa."

Zell looks at her for a moment and then moves to obey. Quistis follows him more slowly, holding Rinoa tightly in her arms. She wonders if she might not have done the exact same thing, to hold on to someone she cared about.

She hopes not. 


End file.
